


Nothing To Bother The Watch With

by gisho



Category: Girl Genius
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Jagers, Pre-Canon, Spies and Secret Agents, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:14:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21935050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gisho/pseuds/gisho
Summary: While the Wulfenbach Empire gets ready to deal with yet another rebellion, the women of Mechanicsburg pass on some gossip and deal with things at home. Someone has to keep the place running.
Comments: 20
Kudos: 93
Collections: Girl Genius Spark-Exchange Yuletide 2019





	Nothing To Bother The Watch With

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Para](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Para/gifts).



> For Para for the 2019 Spark-Exchange. Thanks for the prompts; Women Being Awesome is a fun tag to aim for! Hope you enjoy.

\--

Ozana had been making the wagon run to Sturmhalten every other week for three years now. It was easy work for a tidy profit, hauling barrels of fresh Golden Pearl snails to the taverns to fry, and if she timed it right leaving, it meant she could spend six nights alone in the wagon with her cosy spirit stove and the noises of the wilderness, far away from the smell of her grandmother's coffee and the noise of her little brothers re-enacting the Battle of Copenhagen Reef.

Or, on some nights, it meant she got better company. 

"Hy do not tink dis fellow iz going to make it over de Danube," Jenka said, and spun the spit. Her scarf was loose around her neck, but her pale hair was still tucked under her broad-brimmed purple hat. Ozana wasn't sure what kind of bird she'd turned up with for supper. _Iz fine for humans to eat iv hyu stick vit de meat bits, dun worry_ was all the detail her friend had volunteered. "He hez de tactical skill, vitch iz better dan most uv dese little conquering types, but he dun have de armament. Hy dun see vy de _Magnetic Prince_ hez any trouble getting steel, but dere it iz. Hy give it six months before de Baron vipes him out."

"That long, huh?" Ozana pulled her furs a little closer. Winter would slow everyone down on the roads, but the Baron ruled from the skies. "Before he gets sick of dodging and sends in the Jägerkin, you mean?"

"Unless some scmott boy comes up vit someting better den magnets first, und he sends in de Jägerkin right den." Jenka rolled her eyes. "Iv de Baron vants to soften him up furst vit bombing runs he ken get de bombs from Bucharest, though. Mechanicsburg gets to stey right out uv dis vun."

"Pity. It's not been much of a tourist season."

The noise Jenka made in answer made her distaste for tourists, or possibly tourists who were put off by something as minor as a little rain, very clear. Behind her Füst yawned, his throat looking very big and pink. Ozana resisted the urge to reach over and scratch him behind the ears. He was a one-woman bear, not that he'd maul her without permission. 

The bird-like-thing was crackling nicely. Ozana prodded it with her knife; the little golden bubble of skin popped and let out a dribble of blood. Not quite cooked, then. "Anyone else feeling stupid and ambitious, or is the Magnetic Prince it for rebellions this year?" 

"If dere iz anyone else dey iz being very quiet und very schmott." Jenka gave her usual exquisite shrug. "Hy only know vat de Baron hez already schmelled."

Which was the problem with the whole arrangement. Mechanicsburg could hardly keep a proper spy network across the whole of Europa. They didn't have the population. Their intelligence apparatus consisted of a handful of soldiers and bureaucrats in the Baron's employ, a pastry chef in Kiev, a caterer's assistant in Paris, and a quiet understanding with certain members of Her Undying Majesty's diplomatic corps. And Jenka, who got everywhere. If it weren't for spying on other people's spies they'd have no idea what was going on. 

Ozana rubbed her temple. She was getting another headache. "Well, at least we don't have to get the lava throwers repaired again yet. You'd think he didn't _want_ us melting invading troops."

"Hy tink he iz just afraid ve melt hiz beeg airship."

"They only fire two hundred meters. Not really worth it for ground-to-air."

Jenka conceded the point with a snort, and gave the bird another spin. Somewhere in the darkness a gale-knight was making its metallic mating call. The air was starting to smell like rain. 

\--

It wasn't the first time Guiseppe had been to Mechanicsburg, which was why he'd been chosen for the _vital mission_. The Prince had been very clear. Of course his own magnetic weapons were superior, but if the usurper Wulfenbach got his hands on Pluto Heterodyne's old animal magnetizer, it would slow down the conquest, and speed was vital. 

Guiseppe wasn't sure why, given how much stronger the Prince's spiral field generators were than anything from eighty years before - even a Heterodyne artefact - but he wasn't going to ask questions. 

He made his way through the gates behind a wagon full of anonymous crates, driven by a girl with a dozen braids and a fur-trimmed cape - lucky her - and slipped away almost as soon as he was inside. It was meant to be somewhere near the Iron Bridge. This late in the year the crowds were thin, and the sky was iron-grey, threatening snow. Guiseppe adjusted his stupid blue felt hat and hoped his hurry and glower would only look like someone trying to get back to their warm hotel. 

It took longer than it should have to find the Iron Bridge. He was sure there had been a little alley cutting through from Simon's Cheese Continent, and equally sure those gargoyles on the funny little arch next to the Shipwright's Guild hadn't been there, although the arch itself seemed familiar. But he made it eventually, and then Guiseppe could pull out the magnetometer disguised as a pocketwatch - the Prince thought of everything - and start to hunt in earnest. 

He just hoped it turned out to be small enough to take home in his cabin trunk. Smashing the thing and leaving the pieces in whatever vault they'd hidden it would serve the same purpose, but it would be so much more satisfying to bring back to the Prince as a trophy. 

\--

"No disruption as far as Vienna, then?"

"Not unless he's a lot smarter than he looks. It really does seem like we can sit this one out." Ozana tapped her fingers on the table. Her hair was starting to frizz out of its dozen braids, as if she'd spent six days on the road with no opportunity to redo them, which was entirely true. Her eyes darted back and forth. She always looked nervous to be trading espionage information in the back room of Heliotrope Scribe and Book Works _while they were open_ , even with the low clatter of the printing press out front banging out five hundred copies of _Up The Dyne Valley With Crossbow And Flamethrower_. 

Arella, who had more experience with just how little attention customers usually paid to their surroundings, shoved the plate of gingerbread over to her. "At least the Jägers will get some fun," she offered. 

"Yes. And we don't even get any nice weapons contracts. Why does nobody _competent_ ever try overthrowing the Baron? I swear, it's like they're getting instructions from penny-sparklies."

"I don't know, that Vapnoople fellow seemed competent. Made good wolfmen, at least." Arella sipped her tea while she thought it over. "And the idiot with the mechanical elephants had a very smart head minion."

"What do you mean? That business with the single combat -"

"Typical Spark grandstanding. But _someone_ got them over the Alps, and came up with the airship-fishing idea. He was being managed. If he'd had the sense to do everything his head minion said -"

"He wouldn't have been a madboy," Ozana declared, rolling her eyes.

Arella smiled. The girl had a point. There was a reason the Seneschals had run Mechanicsburg for nine hundred years. Some of the Heterodynes had even had the sense to stay in the labs and let them get on with it. Or go adventuring and let them get on with it - it had nearly driven them bankrupt to build the Great Hospital, without the taxes from their old Fleshyards customers, and it had taken half a decade before they were getting more than a trickle of desperate patients. Not that Bill and Barry were home enough to notice the difference.

Well, when the Masters came back, they wouldn't be able to say she and Poppa had let the town go to ruin.

Or her son, for all he'd spent most of last year lurking in a coffeeshop. Where she should really send Ozana next. "Have you given your reports to Vanamonde yet?"

"Nfr - not yet," Ozana admitted, hastily swallowing her gingerbread. "Not that much to report, really. We can ignore the Magnetic Prince, the Baron's not doing anything interesting, really the worst of it is that Šeher is debating going protectionist about fine metalwork again and Šeher couldn't settle a debate on closing the gates if they saw the Jägerkin coming down the road waving battleaxes, so." She shrugged. "No news is good news?"

"Probably," Arella granted. "Gives us some time to deal with local problems, anyway."

"Why, what's going on in town?"

Ozana, Arella reminded herself, was all of eighteen and if she'd been born a hundred years ago would probably have tried to join the Jägers just to get out of town a little more, and as it was she managed to be out of town half the time on business. Convenient for keeping in touch with people who, say, didn't want to be seen in Mechanicsburg or send letters to Poppa directly, but it kept her ear firmly off the ground. Arella spared a glance at the front of the shop. It was still deserted. "For one, there was an outbreak of Dennikin's Eczema in the Greens."

"The one that spreads -"

"From trees to people, yes, and turns their skin - well. Good thing we have the hospital. We might still have to burn down the vectors, but Hodges is dragging his feet about killing all those beautiful birches." Ozana had gone as green as someone with her complexion could. Not a disproportionate reaction. "Also, some idiot tourist got into the closed collection of the Military Science Museum and turned on all the chickadees."

Ozana's face went from green to red. "What idiot left them _charged_?"

"Believe me, once I figure that out they'll be fired." Or maybe just tarred and feathered, if she was in a good mood. "We have forty percent of them rounded up with minimal casualties. And there's the repaving in Chthologous Lane."

There was an awkward pause before Ozana, who was certainly _clever_ even if she was better informed about the world than her home, answered, "I'm sure there's some good reason for that to be unreasonably difficult and I have no idea what. Will you tell me or is this some kind of quiz?"

Maybe she wasn't being fair to the girl. Not everyone needed to keep track of these things. It was the Seneschal's job. Which was to say, Arella's, because Poppa was growing old, as much as he hated to admit it, and Vanamonde was still feeling his way into the job, spinning his own careful web. "No, I'll tell you. Eat your gingerbread. It's one of those ridiculous face-saving things, just a lot of men trying not to pay each other any money ..."

\--

Two hours past sunset, Mamma Gkika's was turning busy. Guiseppe had gotten a seat  
near the front, at a table apparently made from someone's old front door and two whiskey barrels, and was carefully ignoring the gaggle of young men in too-tight shirts explaining to each other who their favourite dancers were. He was here to watch the pretty girls in fangs, like a proper tourist. Anything he overheard was incidental. Really, since he'd not managed to get a table near the Burgermeister. 

The girl at the bar - an ordinary human dressed as an ordinary human, unless you counted the horns, which Guiseppe didn't since he'd passed a stall selling Genuine Fake Monster Horns (Amaze your Friends!) on his way in to town - had suggested Old Spiral. He'd learned the hard way last time, so Guiseppe had gotten mulled wine instead. The dancers must still be getting ready; the curtains rustled, and strangled calliope noises in no particular tune emerged from time to time. 

The only question now was whether to wait until the cabarets closed at three, or trust to the dark and bad weather to hide him when he went back at midnight. It wasn't as if the Little Ducklings Nursery School was a tourist draw. 

Why exactly such a powerful piece of Sparkwork was in a nursery school basement, Guiseppe could only guess. Camouflage, maybe. Certainly it was the last place anyone would look if they hadn't come armed with a magnetometer.

He watched absently as a brown-haired woman in a plain wool dress vanished through the door behind the bar, and a few moments later, a woman in a metal-decorated corset and fangs, clutching a pike, emerged and headed for the door. It was a different woman, darker-skinned and taller even allowing for the boots, but the effect was disconcerting. It was just then that the calliope music started in earnest, a just-recognizable rendition of the Danube Squid Song. Every customer in the place was leaning back, rearranging their chairs for the best possible look at the stage.

He was here to play tourist. Guiseppe did the same.

\--

Gkika ducked backstage as the first chair went flying. The stage was supposed to be off limits, and they tried, really, but she didn't want to trust her skull to her brothers' aim. Besides, she had company. She'd spotted Arella slipping in the back before she blew the starting whistle. 

Her friend was looking perfectly respectable and neat, as usual; she'd pulled out her nice winter dress with the red wool and lace trim. Gkika promptly yanked her into a hug, as always, and Arella mumbled something about crumpling her dress even as she returned it, as always. When she let go she was still smiling, but it looked a little strained. "Bad news this time."

"Oh? How'z dat?"

"The Baron is probably going to send in the Jägers to deal with the rebellion. Not right away, but by spring."

"Und how iz dat bad news?" Gkika put her hands on her hips. "De boyz can use a bit ov fun. Iz vot, two years since dat fellow in Denmark vit de geese?" Gkika was sorry to have missed that particular campaign; aerial combat wasn't a Jäger specialty, but some smart boy had rigged up escape gliders that were a little more controllable, and the victory feasts had been impressive. Even the local humans had joined in once they got the things cooked. "Iv de scmott guy vit de magnets iz stoopid enough not to run ven he hears de Jägers iz on de way."

"And when was the last time a Spark was willing to back down just because they were hideously outclassed?" Arella rolled her eyes. "It's going to be a drag-out fight."

"Not too long ov a drag vonce my boyz join in."

"Still. He has clanks. Clanks don't run away. I'm just saying -"

"- stot now vit de brewing, so ve haz lots of battledraught?" Gkika grinned, since Arella wasn't the sort of human to be scared of it. "Dat Hy can do. Und tank hyu for de warning. Now why dun ve sit down vit a drink and hyu can tell me all about it?"

There was a spectacular crash, like a wooden table impacting the wall outside at speed. Probably Little Ivan showing off again. With any luck he hadn't split his stitches. It was followed by the kind of hearty cheer that suggested the fight had paused so everyone could watch it bounce. 

Arella, who after all was only human, pressed her hand to her forehead. "In the armoury, please?"

"Hy'll get de drinks."

Gkika's bar did have a trophy wall. That was common knowledge, at least to the Jägerkin. It held the interesting things they'd taken from defeated enemies that someone in the horde might want to try out. The armoury with its careful shockproofing and blank locked door was for things Jägers considered unsporting, best kept buried unless - maybe _until_ \- some Heterodyne decided to improve them, or use them for target practice. They were carefully boxed up, and the less stable ones were packed in lead and steel. By the Heterodyne's minions, Gkika had made sure of that, because she knew the Jägerkin. 

Someday she'd have to get someone to go through this stuff and figure out what needed to be taken to bits and how to keep it from blowing up while they did.

But for now there was no Heterodyne. There was only Arella, who was a Seneschal's widow and so sane it almost wrapped around, sitting below a rack of hypnogas canisters with her hands folded primly on a crate of locust eggs. Gkika folded herself onto the other empty cask - it turned out Vanderbilt's No. 14 evaporated after a decade or so, but Gkika wasn't quite stupid enough to throw the empty casks on a fire - and handed over the short stein. "Drink up," she said. "Iz new stock."

Arella raised an eyebrow as she took a sip. "Perry? Where did you get it?"

"Off a cargo floater from Copenhagen. Josiah said he vas tired of beer. He'z not doink so vell," she admitted. "Hy figures a change von't hurt."

"Tired of beer? He's not going off like Ivo, is he?" 

Gkika could only shrug. She'd known humans who got like that, refusing all the things they used to enjoy and sleeping off wounds long after they should have healed, but the Jägerkin had always been content as long as they had each other. Not counting Ivo, who was discontent regardless. Or Jenka and Axel, but they were special cases. Josiah worried her and all she could do was guess.

One more problem for the Heterodyne. 

And not for Arella, either. "Dis Magnetic Prince," Gkika began. "He iz not gettink close to here, iz he?"

"Not even over the Danube, Jenka says. We don't have to get any defences ready. Assuming the Baron's people are forecasting right."

"Dey'z reliable. Und if dey got it all kinds of wrong for vunce Klaus vill be too busy to notice ve is gettink ready."

"I know." Arella grimaced. "You won't even have to come upstairs."

"Ve would, though," Gkika assured her, and patted the hand that was clenched in a fist on the tabletop, for all her friend's voice was even. "Iv it came down to it. Dere vas a deal vit Klaus, but he iz not our Heterodyne." 

Arella turned her hand over, and spun her glass in the other. "Nobody is, right now."

"De Masters always come home eventually. So ve make sure they still have vun, yez?" She lifted her own glass, to clink against Arella's for an impromptu toast. "Hyu only remember Saturnus und Bill -"

"Just Bill, really. I'm not that old."

Wasn't she? It was so hard to keep track with humans. "Jest Bill, den. But Hy remember de Red Heterodyne. Hy vas vit him in de caverns for two years und Hy had to talk him into not thinking de sun vas rising in de south ven ve got back up, becawz dat was so much liklier den hiz compass goink wrong. Und Hy vas vit Dagon ven he died of ribbonfish in de Black Sea und Hy helped his lady bring him back vit veird potion recipes out of Skraal. Und Hy vas dere vit a drink ven Lazarus climbed out ov hiz tomb de first time. De Heterodynes _alvays_ come home. Master Bill iz jest takink a leetle longer."

The smile that got was only a little strained. "He should hurry up. Poppa and I can't run this place forever."

"Hund lettle Van? Iz he goink to be ready?"

"Oh, sure, he knows how the town works. He knows everything that goes on here." Arella rolled her eyes, but from the motherly fondness in her smile she wasn't that annoyed. "Approximately. It's just ..."

"Tell me." Gkika squeezed her hand again.

"Sometimes I feel like the whole town's going strange. Like we've gotten tired of beer." Her smile was rather wan. "You don't see it from down here, but people aren't keeping things repaired like they used to. Not just the defences, I don't blame people for leaving those alone with the Empire breathing down our necks, but little things. Why keep the Dancing Fountain oiled when it hasn't danced since the Castle broke? Why paint your house when the tourists aren't going to see it? Why give the Yellow Hierophants the good feed when they're all being exported and the Mechanicsburg-grown stamp is more important than the actual taste? It's - little things. People don't have civic pride anymore. They just pretend to for the tourists. You can buy a souvenir mug with a picture that doesn't really look like Franz, and go see the shadow plays about adventures the Heterodyne Boys never really had, and go watch pretty barmaids dressed up as Jägers even if real Jägers would make most of these people run away screaming. Uh."

"No offenze taken," Gkika assured her. "Hy iz trying verry hard not to scare de customers if Hy hez to go upstairs." 

"My point is, the town's just - going to sleep. Turning into a, a parody of itself. Bill hed better hurry up und come home. We're not suppozed to be part of an Empire. Unless de Heterodyne iz ruling it."

Arella must be tired, if her native accent was coming through. Gkika took a long gulp of perry while she thought about it. "Vell," she said, "better Klaus den de Magnetic Prince. He at least keeps de boyz busy."

"Oh, that reminds me. Van spotted a problem. We need to borrow some of your girls for the night. Who can you spare?"

"Vun of doze leetle problems not to bodder de Watch vit? Take Philia und Ljuba. Dey mek a good team."

\--

It had been a good idea to wait, Guiseppe thought. The streets had been practically deserted. He'd gotten into the Little Ducklings Nursery School with hardly any effort - the door lock was carved like a monster's head, but it was just an ordinary tumbler setup once you lifted the jaw. Inside the school it had just been a matter of ignoring the skeletal decoration long enough to find the basement stairs, and here he was, standing in front of a door marked 'Valve Room 3' with his magnetometer jittering like an angry beetle in a tin.

He tucked it back into his pocket. He took a deep breath. He settled one hand on the thermic depolarizer, one on the doorlatch, and twisted it open.

"Vell, vell, vell," came a voice out of the darkness beyond. "Hyu took long enough."

Another voice chimed in, "Hy don't tink he knew ve vere here."

"Vell, how stupid iz he? Ov cawz we guard de artifacts."

There was a lantern in his pocket and Guiseppe wanted to ignore that and start firing wildly, except he couldn't quite tell where the voices were coming from, and with his luck the thermic depolarizer would destroy Pluto Heterodyne's animal magnetizer just as easily as it had taken out that clicking-horse's brains on the way here. "Shut up," he yelled into the dark while he fumbled his lantern loose, and took three steps forward. "I'm not afraid of you." The distant light of the stairwell vanished. He couldn't let himself be frightened. This was a vital mission. His master was _depending_ on him. He scraped the lantern open one-handed against his belt.

There were two faces with grinning fangs _right there_ and the horns on the left one and the fur on the right made were enough to kill any hope he was up against a couple of local toughs with old-fashioned accents. What were Jägermonsters doing in Mechanicsburg anyway? Hadn't the treacherous Baron had them exiled for - some reason and now was not the time, he had to think of something.

He could bluff. They didn't _know_ he couldn't fire. 

"Back off and nobody gets hurt," he yelled, and yanked up the depolarizer. "Just go away, I'm here to-"

"Hy hope iz not to scare uz," Horns purred, and the clawpricks of her fingers closed on his wrist and _squeezed_ and Guiseppe bit back a scream as the bones in his wrist ground together. The depolarizer clattered on the floor. "Und iz a leetle late for nobody gettink hurt."

"But notting to vorry about," the other said, "for hyu iz all over soon," and there was a whistling noise and a sudden pain in his head and then, for Guiseppe, nothingness.

\--

"I'm just saying, he's heavy. If we chuck him in the Dyne right now maybe we can walk back to Mamma's without getting blisters."

Ljuba gave her friend an eyeroll. "Shouldn't have worn your work shoes."

"I can't believe you wore _clogs._ Who ever heard of a Jäger in clogs?"

"He wasn't going to be watching our feet!"

"Watch yours, left, my left," Philia answered, and Ljuba stepped automatically. The unconscious spy she had by the armpits, so much dead weight, swayed in her grip. She glanced over; the abandoned lump of sodden rag she'd just avoided might once have been someone's festive hat. Philia went on, "It's not like we're going to let him go home. How useful can he possibly be alive? He was a complete idiot. At least if we chuck him in the Dyne the ducks will have a good dinner. And don't tell me I shouldn't be talking about this in public. It's four in the morning. Even the Gingerbread House is closed by now and the bakers don't start work for an hour and a half. We should chuck him in the river, go tell Mamma he's dead, and then we can go get dinner." 

"Breakfast," Ljuba said, not for the first time. "If we're eating it at five in the morning it's breakfast. And what was that about nobody being on the streets?" 

"The Rusty Gear doesn't count. Anyone who eats there is a local." Philia sniffed in disdain. The fake fur was starting to peel - spirit gum and fog didn't mix well - and it gave her a mangy look that she would be utterly horrified if Ljuba laughed at, so Ljuba held it in. 

"You can drop his legs if you like. I don't think Mamma will care if he gets dragged back as long as we don't destroy his head." 

"I'm not going to make you do all the hard work. Come on, left turn up ahead." 

The foggy streets were deserted all the way back to Mamma Gkika's. The spy was starting to stir by the time they got the doors open, but Philia pulled out the bottle of oleum dulcinea again and that put an end to that. 

\--

"Petrică sends his love, by the way. He lost the leg, but Mamma's making him a peg for now." Ozana stuck one hand out from her furs to clutch her mug of broth. This high up the spring air was still cold enough to make their breath come out in clouds, and tiny snowflakes were melting as they hit the campfire. 

"Gud. Hy thought so." Her brother might be a reckless idiot, but all her brothers were tough. If she'd wondered whether the injury was going to be Petrică's last, well, no point worying now. Jenka lifted her own mug in a mock-toast. "Hat least de Magnetic Prince hed style. Dey say vas a good rant he vas giving ven my brudders smeshed him vit his own giant rotor ting." 

That got a grin out of Ozana. "Oh yes. The Baron's sending around propaganda posters. _These were his last words. Think twice._ I wonder how long until we get another one?" 

"Hy dunno. Maybe somevun tinks dey ken do better." 

"Bunch of poseurs. They'll never be as good as the Heterodynes." 

The Old Heterodynes, Jenka didn't say. There hasn't been a Heterodyne Empire in a long time. If Master Bill doesn't come back - 

Better not to think about it. Let the girl take a bit of pride in Mechanicsburg. 

\--


End file.
